Balls and Cocktails

5-15-12


The soccer shindig wasn’t bad!

I was very nervous since I am not so good with that much social interaction with people I don’t know. Turns out I am getting better at the whole thing. I had a couple of people I knew, therefore making it a little easier to mingle.

What really I think got the ball rolling, though, was this wonderful woman who greeted us when we arrived. We were a couple of the first ones there, and I didn’t know the other 6 people. Yet this woman comes up to us as we walk in and says, “You must be Ken and Gena (pronounced right, I might add)!”

I about fell over, and was very confused. Ken didn’t know her either, but she was delightful. Turns out she is married to Nick, who is the gentleman who is stepping down from the Area Director position that our RM is taking over. They are this adorable older couple, and I loved watching them together. Even with her obsessive need to make sure people were comfortable in a restaurant, you could see with every time Nick told her to sit and have a good time, he said it with this wonderful affection in his voice. She brought him food from the bar and it was so cute how she doted on him. I hope to be that happy when I am in my 70’s.

Dinner was yummy, and free cocktails are always welcome. I was seated next to our buddy Jim, and across from Bill and his lovely wife. Actually, it was cool since at some point she and I got into an interesting discussion on attachment parenting. It wasn’t heated, it was insightful, and I enjoyed it a great deal. We had some other conversations between us and Jim and Ken and Bill. An all-around nice time I would say.

I have to say I was amused at how young I am compared to everyone there. We were talking old school AYSO and high school ball, and it came up that I was class of 93. Bill’s wife was pointing out the youngest of her 6 (!!!!) kids was 1 at that point.

So many of these people there have been with the program since their kids first started, and even once their kids moved on, they stuck with it. Some of them I think have even coached grandkids in the program. It is fascinating to me how people can be so involved with something like this. It is a social thing, I suppose. I know they all seem to love the game, and there are some people, like Jim, that I can tell love nothing more than coaching these young kids on not just skills, but on how to have a good day on the field. It is pretty amazing.

For now, I am content to just do the soccer stuff for the boys, and also I like the idea of doing something with Ken. I wish I had the passion, but I don’t know that this is me. I know Ken loves it. It is similar to his Lego Tournaments and probably even going back farther, many of the church activities he did as a kid.

Who knows, maybe if I actually didn’t fight this whole thing, I might enjoy it more. As Ken says, I need to own it, and I will probably have way more fun.

But maybe some of the fun is in the fight. LOL!